The ideas of Hutton & Lyall that Darwin incorporated into his theory pertained to

the age of Earth & gradual change

Which of the following is not an observation or inference on which natural selection is based?

Poorly adapted individuals never leave offspring

Which of the following would provide the best information for distinguishing phylogenetic relationships between several species that are almost identical in anatomy?

molecular comparisons of DNA & amino acid sequence

Which of the following observations helped Darwin shape his concept of descent with modification?

South American temperate plants were more similar to the tropical plants of South America than to the temperate plants of Europe

Darwin synthesized information from several sources in developing his theory of evolution by natural selection. Which of the following did not influence his thinking?

Mendel's paper describing the basic principles of inheritence

In science, the term theory generally applies to an idea that

attempts to explain many related phenomena

Within a few weeks of treatment with the drug 3TC, a patient's HIV population consists entirely of 3TC-resistant viruses. How can this result best be explained?

A few drug-resistant viruses were present at the start of the treatment & natural selection increased their frequency

The smallest biological unit that can evolve over time is

a population

Which of the following ideas of is common to both Darwin's & Lamarck's theories of evolution?

Evolutionary adaptation results from interactions between organisms & their environments

Which f the following pairs of structures is least likely to represent homology?

The bark of a tree & the protective covering of a lobster

What were the two main parts in Darwin's The Origin of Species?

Descent of diverse species from common ancestors & natural selection as the mechanism of evolution

Darwin's phrase for evolution, _____ with _____, captured the idea that an ancestral species could diversify into many descendant species by the accumulation of different _____ to various environments.

descent, modification, adaptations

To Cuvier, the differences in fossils from different strata were evidence for

local catastrophic events such as droughts or floods

Darwin proposed that new species evolve from ancestral forms by

the gradual accumulation of adaptations to changing or different environments

The best description of natural selection is

the reproductive success of the members of a population best adapted to the environment

The remnants of pelvic & leg bones in a snake

are vestigial structures

The hypothesis that whales evolved from land-dwelling ancestors is supported by

fossils of extinct whales found in Egypt & Pakistan that had small hind limbs

Darwin's claim that all of life descended from a common ancestor is best supported with evidence from

molecular biology

What might you conclude from the observation that the bones in your arm and hand are similar to the bones that make up a bat's wing?